The White House has chosen to honour Akili Dada founder and executive director, Dr. Wanjiru Kamau-Rutenberg, as one of fourteen Champions of Change who are leaders in American Diaspora communities with roots in the Horn of Africa. These leaders are helping to build stronger neighborhoods in communities across the country, and are working to mobilize networks across borders to address global challenges. Akili Dada works to empower a new generation of African women leaders.

A dozen traditional gold mining sites have appeared in recent years in the province of Ganzourgou. Gold panners from all over flock there to work the sites, most often living in the greatest promiscuity, without any infrastructure for sanitation and with no access to public basic services. The miners migrate according to the discovery of new veins of gold, usually moving there from the rural areas of Burkina Faso as well as from neighbouring countries (Togo, Benin, Ghana). Between one quarter and one third of them are under 18.

Visit the website to read about the People's Land! Housing! and Jobs! Summit that was due to take place 27 - 29 January, but instead led to a number of arrests. The summit was to discuss and develop 'a more radical people driven program for the proper integration of our cities and establishing the right of families to a basic income, jobs, economic opportunities, social mobility, housing, land and the right to the city.'

Young people Tweeting from mobile devices are driving the growth of Twitter in Africa, according to How Africa Tweets, new research launched in Nairobi. In the first ever attempt to comprehensively map the use of Twitter in Africa, Portland Communications and Tweetminster analysed over 11.5 million geo-located Tweets originating on the continent during the last three months of 2011.

The body of Zimbabwe’s first army commander General Solomon Mujuru had a hole in the abdomen and emitted blue flames when it was retrieved from his farmhouse that was gutted by fire last year, an inquest heard on Tuesday. Police Constable Clatwell Garisayi, who was the 23rd witness to give evidence after the inquest opened last week. Mujuru was considered to be the only politician in President Robert Mugabe’s Zanu PF who could stand up to the 87-year-old leader. He was believed to be leading one of the factions positioning themselves in anticipation of the ageing President Mugabe’s departure.

Years of interviews, investigative reporting, and analysis of classified US government documents went into a book on right-wing paramilitarism in Haiti.

The ECOWAS Commission has said that it roundly condemns the spate of terror attacks in different parts of Nigeria. It maintained that the attacks by Boko Haram were 'aggravating insecurity among both citizens and visitors'. According to the sub-regional group, the West African leaders have noted with regret that 'the latest deadly attacks in the country’s ancient northern city of Kano on Friday, January 20, 2012 happened in spite of the determined efforts by the government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to rein in those behind these attacks.' Nigeria’s violent situation has reportedly featured at the United Nations Security Council.

The international dimension of Liberia’s civil war is rarely given the attention it deserves, writes Boima Tucker on the blog Africa is a Country. 'The fact that Charles Taylor stands on trial for war crimes in Sierra Leone points to it partially, but often not realized are the roles that countries like Libya, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, and Nigeria played in initiating a truly multinational war. Recent revelations by the CIA - which have always been suspected - put the United States’ role in the war at center stage, adding fuel to claims of outside intervention in Liberian politics, since its founding as a Western style nation-state, up until today.'

World Bank Managing Director Caroline Anstey recently announced a new partnership with Google that will apparently empower citizen cartographers in 150 countries worldwide. This has provoked some concern among open source enthusiasts. The worry is, says this post, that Google will organize crowdsourced mapping projects and use people with local knowledge to improve Map Maker data, which will carry Google licencing agreement restrictions. Does this really empower citizen cartographers?

Alleged brutality by security forces against journalists and proposed draconian legislation against newspapers have plunged Uganda 43 places lower in the latest press freedom ranking by the Paris-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF). The Press Freedom Index notes that an increased number of journalists in Uganda reported more acts of violence meted out on them by security agencies. 'Journalists in Uganda were the targets of violence and surveillance during the presidential election in February (2011) and were targeted again during the brutal crackdown on the Walk-to-Work protests later in the year, when dozens of journalists were arrested,' the report indicated.

Malawi is losing $28 million (about MK4.6 billion) worth of fisheries resources each year due to unsustainable fishing in natural bodies, an estimate which represents 0.8 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), according to the Ministry of Finance and Development’s Economic valuation of Sustainable Natural Resource Use report in Malawi.

South African President Jacob Zuma has summoned Madagascar interim authorities for an urgent meeting in Pretoria in a fresh attempt to resolve the political deadlock in the island nation. This after a plane carrying the exiled leader Marc Ravalomanana home was turned away. The party of Ravalomanana then decided to suspend its role in Madagascar's unity government citing violation of the political roadmap.

Because of the outstanding success of the workshops at last year's annual meeting in Washington, D.C., the ASA will welcome proposals for workshops on a wide range of topics to be held on Wednesday, November 28, 2012, prior to the 55th Annual Meeting.

Last year's workshops were organized by the Library of Congress, Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, American University; and scholars from the University of Texas-Houston School of Public Health in collaboration with the National Institutes of Health. Topics included health in Africa, governance and development, new technologies in the field of museum studies, and information resources and materials.

To propose a workshop, please visit the to view and complete the application. Submit the completed document as an attachment to [email][email protected] or mail to: Pre-Conference Workshops, African Studies Association, Rutgers University-Livingston Campus, 54 Joyce Kilmer Avenue, Piscataway, NJ 08854. The deadline to submit applications is March 15, 2012. Applicants will be notified of the Program Committee's decision in early April.

Wednesday 25 January marked the one-year anniversary since the beginning of 18 days of protests that ousted the previous regime of Hosni Mubarak. Since that day, Egypt remains struggling to see the revolution succeed. Website has a useful timeline of important events throughout the year.

Allieu Sesay, a broadcast journalist working with Freetown-based Radio Democracy, was reportedly assaulted on 15 January 2012 and briefly detained by some policemen drawn from the Operation Support Division (OSD) of the Sierra Leonean police. Sesay met his ordeal when covering the arrest of Aziz Carew, a constituency chairman of the opposition Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) at his Fourah Bay home in the east of the capital Freetown. This was after a bye- election which resulted in violence.

Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta distributed close to Sh50 million to mobilise and arm attackers during the post-election violence, according to the ruling of ICC judges. The money was released in instalments through three former MPs from Kiambu and Nakuru counties and former Mungiki leader Maina Njenga. In the ruling delivered on Monday 23 January, the judges pieced together events leading to the revenge attacks on ODM supporters in Naivasha and Nakuru by Mungiki members, who were said to be supporters of the rival Party of National Unity (PNU).

Last week BBC News reported that 70,000 indigenous people have been forced to relocate in the western Gambella region of Ethiopia to new villages that lack adequate resources for their survival. The land has been signed over to foreign investors, including Saudi Star Agriculture Development Plc, a company owned by Saudi-Ethiopian billionaire Mohammed Al Amoudi. Saudi Star has begun rice cultivation on 10,000ha of land in Gambella and a 10,000ha irrigation project along the already-compromised Alwero River. Only grain that does not meet export requirements will be sold locally.

Malawi's president says he has ordered police to arrest anyone who attacks women for wearing trousers in public. President Bingu wa Mutharika spoke out on national radio after several women were beaten and stripped on the street for wearing non-traditional dress.

Liberia’s President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has opted to come clean over her role in the country’s civil war. Over the years innuendoes have circulated about her sponsoring the National Patriotic Front of Liberia of former warlord Charles Taylor, who is facing possible conviction before the UN-backed Sierra Leone Specia Court sitting at The Hague. Mrs Sirleaf is now promising to appear before the Leymah Gbowee committee set up last year to address pre-election abuses. The president she was ready to 'challenge the untruths' about her civil war role.

OSIWA calls for proposals that seek to:
1. Foster building of strong governance institutions, processes and structures that are transparent, accountable and intolerant of impunity;
2. Build the capacity of civil society organizations and increase citizen participation in decision-making processes and
3. Promote the protection of fundamental rights and citizenship groups exposed to discrimination.

The programs will be implemented in one or more of these countries: Benin, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal and Sierra Leone.

Please click on the link provided to access the full Call for Proposals, which contains further links to a detailed strategy to guide the application process and the application documents.